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Today there is a fine line between doing the right thing and breaking a law. The role of a retail CEO is playing in a public landmine as political policies may dictate private practices. Take recent moves to limit support of an inclusive workforce. Retailers face backlash from all sides when customers and employees are singled out for their beliefs and lifestyles. Join Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s strategist as they dig into the risks retailers take if they don’t do the right thing for their workforce, customers, and community. The pressure to conform to local bureaucracies at the expense of their stakeholders has created a line in the sand. How do leaders navigate through this pressure cooker? Listen and learn.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

Catalogs are back! And that’s not all. Dynamic pricing is a red-hot topic today…is personalized pricing a real deal? A unified commerce business model opens new channels along with the renaissance of print catalogs. It’s a cost-effective model because it focuses on a customer-centric mindset in a consumer-driven marketplace. Join special guest Laura Barrett, Retail Consultant at Columbus Consulting, Robin Lewis, and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s strategist as they touch on how to build the infrastructure to support a multi-touch point unified model with the right KPIs.

https://www.columbusconsulting.com/who-we-are/our-expertise/

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

How does a brand stay relevant after 53 years? What does it take to keep it vital and iconic? Cotton Incorporated is celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Seal of Cotton this month, with the Seal recognized as a global icon by retailers and brands throughout the textile industry and beyond. To follow Cotton Incorporated’s history is to chart the mandate for sustainability. Join Robin Lewis, Shelley Kohan, TRR’s strategist and special guest Kim Kitchings, Senior Vice President of Consumer Marketing at Cotton Incorporated, as she reveals how to maintain trust and reliability for half a century, supported by science and data from deep research on consumer behavior and how to make cotton more sustainable by reducing environmental impacts during the growth, production, and processing of cotton and by minimizing the environmental impacts at the end of a cotton product’s life cycle. If you care about the planet and are curious about brand integrity, don’t miss this in-depth discussion.

CottonToday – sustainability website

https://cottontoday.cottoninc.com/

Lifestyle Monitor™ - consumer & retail trends, economic data

https://lifestylemonitor.cottoninc.com/

50th Anniversary – Seal of Cotton

https://lifestylemonitor.cottoninc.com/50-year-anniversary/

Blue Jeans Go Green™ - denim recycling program

https://bluejeansgogreen.org/

Cotton Lives On™ recycling program (U.K.)

https://cottonliveson.org/

“Memories are Made in Cotton” advertising campaign

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5hP2euIDvZQLaMmD0oJrcC1M0l3yy7cI

https://thefabricofourlives.com/cotton-news/memories-are-made-in-cotton

Water Sustainability Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pL7J24FrOnU

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

Don’t count your customers out, even when they’re facing turbulent, unpredictable market trends. Last July the growth rate of consumer discretionary purchases was slowing down. This downward trend combined with inflation at near 40-year highs begs the question: How long can consumer spending growth continue? Join special guest Andy Mantis, President of Commerce Signals, Robin Lewis, and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s strategist, as they discuss the finer points of the spending economy. With consumer spending accounting for about 68 percent of U.S. GDP, a spending decline could push the U.S. into a recession. Will it happen? Listen in to find out. And to get a copy of the full report, follow the link.

Q1 2023 Inflation Report

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

AI is not delivering the customer service customers want or retailers thought it would. For all its promise, the lack of human touch, not to mention intuitive empathy, has made AI customer service a nightmare. Added to this, with a worker shortage, there aren’t enough human beings to come to the rescue. Join Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s strategist, as they uncover why stressed-out customers (think financially strapped) are becoming increasingly uncivil to human customer service reps and unhinged with the AI experts (have you yelled at a chatbot recently?). The key question: Who owns service recovery?  Retailers need to get this one right.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

Traditional retail has become unhinged, and we operate in a marketplace where the more things change, the more they change. Forces for change are redefining the new rules of retail in real time. Just look at how Gen Z, a hybrid workforce, loyalty programs, and emerging technologies are resetting the retail playing field. And then there’s generative AI which could turn retail upside down.  Join Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s strategist, as they dive into the new retail realities with special guest, ChatGP, which identifies the seven most important issues facing retailers.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

Much of the world is calling for a pause on AI to reflect and reconsider the immediate impact of emerging tech and the runaway train that is Chat GPT and all its AI iterative language siblings.  And then there’s the looming issue of privacy and consumers’ worries about how to own and protect their own data. A key question is does anyone, regardless of age and generation, want to be targeted by invasive, highly personalized marketing.  Is it flattering or creepy? Join Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s chief strategist as they debate the ethical and security concerns that the new wave of AI presents to retailers and their customers.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

Managing a global business with a portfolio of brands over the past three years has been a challenge for even the most experienced leaders. How do you strategically plan for transformation when the world marketplace is so disruptive, sustainability concerns are mounting, and each workforce in different international markets has specific needs. Marcella Wartenbergh, CEO of AWWG (including brands Pepe Jeans London, Hackett and Façonnable, and is the licensed distributor for Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein in Spain and Portugal) joins Robin Lewis and Shelley E, Kohan, TRR’s strategist, as they discuss how to make an international brand the “employer of choice” for future retail leaders.

For more information on the World Retail Congress in Barcelona please visit their website.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

Gen Z is setting the pace for rethinking fashion. The trend today is gender-fluid fashion and 56 percent of Gen Z shops outside their assigned gender area. Influenced by high-profile celebrities (think Billy Porter and Harry Styles), there is a business case to be made for gender-fluid fashion.  Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s strategist, discuss the challenges and opportunities of gender-fluid fashion...from fewer SKUs, reorganization of merchandising into fluid non-gender-based departments, sizing and educating frontline workers.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!

EV charging stations represent the most electrifying new opportunity for retailers, restaurants, and service providers in generations. Over 1.3 million charging stations are coming online within the next decade, and they bring with them a consumer who will have some time to kill – or make their charging needs into retail destinations. Join TRR reporter Warren Shoulberg with Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan, TRR’s chief strategist as they discuss why EV charging stations could be the next big opportunity to make some additional revenue and why those that jump on it first will reap the benefits.

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.